If Your Rural Community Is Failing, Just Leave? The Revival of Place Prosperity in Rural Development Planning

Abstract

Rural-urban disparities exposed by the Great Recession have rekindled interest in place prosperity approaches to rural development. The conventional wisdom has been skeptical about the efficacy of locality development, preferring to assist rural people to relocate. As a practical matter, however, people are not leaving. The secular trend toward metropolitanization may be ending, reviving interest in place prosperity. One strategy, sometimes termed the new natural resource economy, aims at place prosperity through innovative approaches to resource management and agriculture. We report some of the results of an empirical study of NNRE in Oregon and their implications practice and scholarship.